Yes I know it only seems like five minutes since the last one but it’s that time of year again when we give you, for what it’s worth, our opinion on who made the best music in the celtic-punk scene over 2016. It’s been another outstanding year for the music that we all love and some truly fantastic records came out in the last twelve months. So read on to find out who came #1! Remember though this is only our opinion and these twenty-five album’s are only the tip of the iceberg of what was released last year. Feel free to comment, slag off or dissect our lists. We don’t pretend to be the final word as that my friends is for you…

3. THE CLOVES AND THE TOBACCO (Indonesia)- ‘Across The Horizon’ Review

Absolutely no surprise here at all. For the first time we had an unanimous vote from all the admin’s that sees The Rumjacks sail away with the #1 spot for the second year running. It’s been an outstanding year for the Bhoys and with an American tour on the horizon they about to take another giant step in their campaign of world domination! Other notables were NYC’s Narrowbacks whose second album really showed the depth of their songwriting and could just have easily won the folk/trad best of too! The Cloves And The Tobacco deserve plaudits galore in another fantastic year for Indonesian celtic punk bands while Mickey Rickshaw could probably be said to have won the ‘unified title’ across all the various celtic-punk sites. In all we have twenty five bands from fourteen countries including USA x 6, Australia x 3, Indonesia x2, Germany x2, Netherlands x2, Catalonia x 2, Scotland, Italy, Sweden, Brazil, Spain, Czech Republic, Russia and Belarus with The Wakes being the only Celtic country based band which goes to show how international the scene has become.

A special mention here to the ever prolific and always a pleasurable experience The Mahones who released a greatest hits entitled The Very Best: 25 Years Of Irish Punk which couldn’t be included in the Top 25 but if it did would have given The Rumjacks a run for their money!

TOP TEN CELTIC PUNK EP’S

With The Rumjacks returning a year later to sweep the Album Of The Year it’s no surprise then that Wiltshire lads Mick O’Toole follow up last year’s win in the EP Of The Year awards to do the same thing. A great year for them that has seen them play less and less within the celtic-punk scene and really start to make waves outside of it. A foreign tour and more support slots to various punk rock legends than most bands play in a lifetime and all in the space of twelve months. The Ramshackle Army EP got lost in the post leaving us to do a rush-job review and given time I’m sure they may have given the O’Toole’s a run for their money. Drunken Fairy Tales impressed everyone and Matilda’s vinyl only release deserve a mention as well Mick O’Toole grabbing the 5th spot too.

TOP TEN FOLK/TRADITIONAL RELEASES

Possibly the hardest Best Of List of them all to do is this one as so many releases cross over the genres between rock and punk and folk and trad but our good friend Anto Morra, the ‘London Irish folk-punker’, just edging it from The Logues with his superb tribute to the 1916 Easter Rising. Mickey Rickshaw swept to third with their specially recorded acoustic EP that came out for their European tour and ShamRocks put out an album of high quality and original Irish folk with imagination galore. A special mention for Blackwater Banshee whose EP came out later in the year and shows enormous promise and one or two original songs would have seen a much higher position I am sure.

TOP CELTIC PUNK WEB-SITE

Now this has over the years become the Celtic Folk Punk And More Top Celtic Punk Web-Site award so often has that esteemed site walked away with the top spot but there’s a new kid on the block and this year we are happy to award top spot to our good mates over at Mersey Celt Punks. They only kicked off the site a few months ago but super regular postings on all manner of celtic-punkness has seen them triumphant. You can join their fun over at Twitter and Facebook and we heartily recommend you do. A special mention here also for Viva La XV another new kid on the block which looks amazing but sadly as none of us can read Spanish we can’t tell if it’s as good as it looks! We’re sure it is and you can check it out for yourselves at the Blog or over on Facebook.

Right now the details. The Best Of lists were cajoled and bullied out of the four admins on the London Celtic Punks Facebook page. The various scraps of crumpled paper were received and then tallied up over several pints of Guinness in Mannions in north London while watching the football on the telly.

We are now in our fourth year of doing these Best Of lists so if you would like to have a look at the previous years best in celtic-punk then click the link below the relevant year.

Only one more thing to mention about 2016 and that is to remember here Erik Petersen the lead singer of the influential folk-punk band Mischief Brew who sadly passed away earlier this year. I still find it hard to believe that he has gone but he will always be commemorated.

“So tattoo our arms and raise our glasses, call out your name at New Year’s Eve, maybe next time we kneel at a casket, we can say at least the story’s complete”

Read our obituary for Erik hereand raise a glass the next time you get the chance to.

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Welcome to the third long player from one of the top celtic-punk bands in Europe, Catalan celtic-punkers Drink Hunters (their is no ‘The’). Formed in Barcelona in 2008 they have previously self-released two outstanding albums on a shoestring budget and set about raising money for this one by crowdfunding among their fans who responded magnificently and raised the necessary readies in no time at all. The band got together in Barcelona in 2008 when Pau (drums and vocals) and Aaron (bass and lead vocals) wanted to get a band on the road and decided to follow the path of celtic-punk. They talked about the idea with Raja (guitar and vocals) and a band began to take shape. Only thing now missing was to fill their energetic punk rock with some Irish folk touches. And for that they contacted with Nando (fiddle) and Rosa (accordion) and in early 2013 they signed Isra (Irish tin whistles and banjo) and Drink Hunters were armed and ready to go.

“…which sounds pretty much like NOFX doing celtic-punk! The ‘celtic-NOFX’ label fits in quite well with The Drink Hunters and the majority of the songs fly by in around 2 minutes”

and to be perfectly honest that still fits them pretty damn well. Members have come and gone from the band but Drink Hunters philosophy of combining solid punk rock tunes with Irish traditional folk and themes has made them a sure fire hit across Europe and among those in the know in celtic-punk circles.

Shameless was released in July and is eleven tracks long that rolls in just a minute short of thirty minutes. Of those eleven songs all are written by the band themselves and as usual top marks for that. As much as I do love to hear version after version of ‘I’ll Tell Me Ma’ its far more enjoyable to hear what the band themselves have made and nurtured. Shameless begins with the short and very very snappy ‘1234’ and for a second you could imagine it as Bad Religion till the celtic instruments kick in and Drink Hunters are back with a right bang. All the lyrics are sung in English or should I say Californian! While we would prefer bands to sing in their native tongue its understandable why bands don’t always and Pau from the band is at least honest when he said, when we reviewed their last album,

“yeah, I feel that the English language can open more doors, particularly in this genre which is not very popular in Spain yet”

Next up is ‘Trashy Music’ and again from the start the music kicks in and the Bhoys put the boot into shitty sell out bands which is something you could never accuse them of being. Completely independent and totally DIY in ethos.

The album continues with ‘Do More Listening’ and ‘I Need To Forget’ which ramp up the speed and keep the fiddle player busy keeping up. A fantastic combination of old and new traditions Drink Hunters are that odd thing in celtic-punk. A band that follows no-one, sounds like no-one else and ploughs their own trough in coming up with something truly unique within celtic-punk.

(two songs from the album that were released in advance done all acoustic like!)

Album title track ‘Shameless’ is one of the shortest songs on the album and shows the band at their most fluid as they take the piss out of themselves somewhat.

“And they can say
we have no class
we have bad manners
and we want to be like them

But we’re sure
we’re so prooooud!”

‘Picnic Blanket’ has some real good Irish fiddle parts while the music steamrolls along. A real foot stomper this one and a real album standout. ‘My Car’ treads the same path as before with a silly song about being in love with your car.

“Your car is a crap
My tapes make me so elegant”

They showed they can play their instruments too by recently releasing an acoustic version of ‘My Car’ as well and it rocks mightily!

Next up is ’34’ and fiddle and tin whistle over pounding drums until friend of the band El Nota pops up to do a short rap in the middle. We are storming to the end and their is no let up in the speed of Shameless and ‘What Am I Waiting For?’ is no different. Fast paced and heading out in a bang with ‘Someone Else’ and finally the album comes to an end with my favourite song on the album. Encapsulating everything I love about the celtic punk scene it is called simply ‘Celtic Punks’. In Spain’s fractured land where one day we would hope to see freedom for the Catalans, Basques and Galicians the song offers a hand of friendship. As with Scotland its not necessary to hate your neighbours. One day you will all be on an equal footing so let solidarity be the key to your freedom.

“We are Celtic Punks!

You will never understand why we’ve chosen this path
our way of seeing things neither our music.

This is not a fad, It’s a way of life
feeling it inside our hearts
We’ve not given up yet.
No matter whether you are male or female
We are few people but we are united!

An absolutely storming way to finish and worth the price of the album on its own. The most obvious thing for me that stands out about Drink Hunters is that if they were North American they would be, and pardon my French here, totally fucking massive. They certainly deserve it and as one of the hardest working bands around international stardom shouldn’t be too long with catching up with them.

(have a listen to the whole of Shameless by pressing Play on the Bandcamp player below)

* their are a host of other great bands in the region with Sigelpa also from Barcelona leading the way but one of the best ways to keep up with whats happening in Spain, Catalonia, Galicia, the Basque country and the celtic-punk scene in general is to follow the ever brilliant Celtic Folk Punk And More web-site. Begin here by checking their review of Shameless.

Now we have been around now for so long that we are beginning to do reviews from bands we have already reviewed before but only one band is rounding the corner for their third review and that is the wonderful Sigelpa from Catalonia. The group hail from Terrassa in the Barcelona region of Catalonia and their mix of punk, hardcore and good old fashioned Irish folk music, as I have said before, is right up my street. Everything about the band is pretty amazing right down to their extremely clever name. Its an acronym of the initials of the seven deadly sins in Catalonian. Superbia/ Pride, Ira/ Wrath, Gula/ Gluttony, Enveja/ Envy, Luxuria/ Lust, Peresa/ Sloth and Avaricia/ Greed making up the letters in their name.

April, 2014

October, 2014

March, 2015

April, 2015

Their new album, Rabant Original, was officially released on July 7th just gone and got a limited free release for a week which is when I downloaded it. Now I can’t tell you much about any of the song lyrics sadly as they are all, bar two (one in English and one in Galician), in Catalan so will just stick to the basics here. Sigelpa rattle through their fourteen songs in no time at all with the whole album coming in at only twenty seven minutes and with the majority of their songs around the one and a half / two minute mark it’s a gloriously fast and wicked ride through celtic-punk owned territory! Rabant Original begins with a short intro ‘(pou)’ before ‘Aquí Ens Tens’ and the sound of electric guitar, accordion and fiddle fills the air and we are well away. Dual male and female vocals that is neither shouty nor crooned but fits the music perfectly. The accordion is to the fore in ‘Bronca’ and its really nice to hear female vocals at the front of a band for once rather than just singing the chorus and ‘Puta Ciutat’ show it off perfectly. The video for ‘A Saia Da Carolina’ will be just up your street if you can speak Galician but if not welcome to our world! A top version of this traditional Celtic folk song from Galicia.

The album signature tune ‘Rabant Original’ is pure pop punk with added accordion and fast drumming keeping the tempo right up high. Another highlight is ‘Dinamita’ which is a fast and furious racket with more lovely accordion and reminds me of the Brazilian celtic-punk band Lugh. Only 72 seconds long and over just as it gets going it’s accompanied by a video which shows Sigelpa in all their glory.

The band’s sound is never better than on ‘Us Tornarem A Votar’ with a great slab of celtic punk rock sure to get any bar room up on its feet and dancing away. Their simply is no let up and no time for anything slow here and ‘Culvolució’ carries it all on while ‘Mojigatrix’ is even faster! The only song sung in English is up next with the fecking amazing ‘Excursion Around The Bay’. Made most famous by one of celtic music’s big hitters Great Big Sea from Canada in 2000 on their Road Rage album. Written by Johnny Burke (1851–1930) who was a famous Newfoundland balladeer of his time. Not content to just copy the song Sigelpa inject it full of punk rock spirits and though it may start off quite familiar it ends a million miles away from the original. ‘L’Infern Està Pujant’ and ‘Exorcisme Vaginal’ take us up to the end and more of the same is all we are asking for now. Well played and expertly recorded and produced as well I have to say so well done to JM Castelló and Matias Scheinkman at Canela Hank Studio in Barcelona. The final track is ‘Sexual GGesus’ a fast and relatively long song for them at just under two minutes. Excellent country fiddle giving it a bluegrass sound in a song about punk rock wierdo GG Allin who died of a heroin overdose back in 1993.

And their you have it. All over in well under a half hour and as good a celtic-punk album has been released this year. Fourteen songs of which only two are cover versions. Sigelpa are a brilliant band and one of my favourites in the current celtic-punk scene. Everything they do has a great deal of thought put into it. Both their debut album and ‘Ens Van Diagnosticar Un Transtorn’ were outstanding. Great politics, great musicians, great songs and a great spirit too. Trust me it’s no gamble here get this album and enjoy one of the very best bands in the celtic punk scene today, and certainly one of the most inventive, in ANY scene right now.

(you can listen to the entire album below by pressing play on the Bandcamp player. Its available on CD for only 7 Euros and that is as cheap as chips!)

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The End is Nigh is the follow up album from 13Krauss to their excellent debut album, Seguir En Pie, which was released to great acclaim back in 2014. For our review of that grand album then check out here. Originally forming up as a straight up, no frills punk rock band but after a Real McKenzies show in their home town they were inspired to change direction and take the celtic-punk high road. So the boys went on to add an accordion player and a bagpiper and 13Krauss the celtic punk band were born! Hailing from Zaragoza in what is basically the dead centre of Spain they have become firm favourites on the Spanish scene, and further afield as well, and on the basis of these two albums it is no surprise why either.

The album begins with ‘Reza Por Tu Vida’ and the sound of an ocean and a toiling bell adds some nice touches to this blistering slab of fast and furious celtic-punk. One of only three songs sung in Spanish, the rest are in English, except for the one instrumental. Its a brilliant start with shouty gang vocals atop of acoustic guitar and bagpipes and its very Dropkicks sounding indeed. ‘Doomsday’ follows and reminds me of my current scene fave’s Ferocious Dog with the fiddle looming large and cranked up electric guitar and mandolin. Bodi vocal style is excellent. Shouty and strained but never unintelligible and you know that if pushed he could give it a real ‘croon’ with the best of them. The bagpipes are back out for ‘Flying Broken Chairs’, a catchy as hell track telling of a wicked and wild night down the boozer. They literally just released the video for ‘Flying Broken Chairs’ just yesterday featuring footage from this years St Patrick’s Day gig in Sala López in their home town of Zaragoza.

The best celtic-punk bands have the ability to slow it down and with the aptly named ‘Slow Down’ 13Krauss prove they can do it too. The story is of looking for leprauchauns and has quite the polka sound to it. Much like The Dreadnoughts use to play. Another thing a lot of non-celtic in origin celtic-punk bands are very good at is bringing new sounds and influences into their music and again ‘En Mi Ataúd’ has a sort of polka /Russian thing going on and its great. ‘Don’t Feed The Goblin’ is the only instrumental here and instrumental by name MENTAL by nature. A fast as hell ride through Dropkick Murphy’s style bagpipe punk rock. 13Krauss switch it up again and ‘Miserable Bridges’ has a skate-punk feel to it while again David’s bagpiping is absolutely superb. We are nearing the end now and ‘The Smitting Blow’ changes it up again with a country folk punk number that is unlike anything else here but equally as good and then finally we have ‘El Mañana No Espera’ and the end of the album. The bagpipes are loud and proud and the curtain comes down on this fantastic album with another piece of Murphy’s influenced celtic-punk rock.

The album was recorded and mixed in their home town and the nine tracks clock in at a very healthy thirty minutes. It was released just after St Patrick’s Day earlier in the year and is available for download as ‘name your price’ and only €9 for the actual physical compact disc which comes in a rather nice jewel case with all the song lyrics, credits and pictures in a extensive twelve page booklet. That there’s not a single cover version here is the first thing that struck me on hearing The End is Nigh. Just nine great slabs of celtic-punk that show the influence of other bands in the scene but always with the 13Krauss stamp of individuality on it. They have a great knack of switching it up and just as you feel your in for a ride of Dropkick Murphys expectations your off in another completely different direction. There are some outstanding celtic-punk bands from the region with Catalan bands The Drink Hunters and Sigelpa due to release new albums very soon, Bastards from Galicia still touring Europe relentlessly and The Fatty Farmers having also recently released a excellent new album too. 13Krauss deserve to be heard beyond Spain but also beyond Dropkick Murphys fans too as this album will appeal to all fans of the genre whether you prefer the punky or the folkier side of celtic-punk.

(You can have a free listen to The End Is Nigh by pressing play on the Bandcamp player below. Follow the link below to buy)

One of the best things about doing this here blog-zine is the end of year ‘Best Of’s’. This is our chance to reward, for what it’s worth, and recommend those releases that tickled our collective fancies over the last twelve months. Where as in 2013 the Best Of’s were dominated by local bands and releases and in 2014 it was international bands that stole the show this years is more of a mix of the two. No shocks at the top I’m afraid. It was always going to be a slug out between the big hitters of celtic-punk with The Rumjacks just shading it from the The Mahones by the slightest of margins. One of the team commented that the only difference was that ‘The Hunger And The Fight Part 1’ was slightly better than Part 2. In third place came 1916 out of New York who only just sneaked in with the December release of ‘Last Call For Heroes’. The album came out so late we didn’t even get a chance to mention it let alone review it nevertheless it blew us all away with their brilliant combination of rockabilly and celtic-punk. Another one to file in the ‘shamrockabilly’ category. Overall no major surprises and all four admins lists pretty much tallied up with each other but it’s especially great to see some non-English speaking bands in there as well as some bands that were new to us in the last twelve months. I was particularly happy to see Skontra and The Cundeez make the grade representing celtic-punk as played in the celtic nations. As ever we have reviewed some, though not all of these albums, so click (here) after the title and you will be re-directed to our review. If your album is not here do not be downhearted. These twenty album’s are the tip of the iceberg of what was released last year in what was an outstanding year for celtic-punk. Feel free to comment, slag off or dissect our lists. We don’t pretend to be the final word as that my friends is for you…

TOP TEN CELTIC PUNK EP’S

Now onto the EP’s. These are classed as shorter usually four to six songs long and around anything right up to 15-20 minutes long. No shock here at number one as a unanimous vote saw this years new band of the year Mick O’Toole walk away with the title. They have been a solid fixture during the year building up quite a reputation and following. At number two it’s long been a well known secret that Indonesia is a hotbed of celtic-punk and Dirty Glass are one of the best bands in their flourishing scene and ‘Drunken Summer Nights’ ran O’Toole very close while another English band came in third. Matilda’s Scoundrels really hit the heights in 2015 and just like Mick O’Toole bigger and better things await them in 2016. The rest of the list is made up from bands from across the globe with Slovenia, South Africa, Hungary, Catalonia, Russia, Holland, France and Yorkshire all making the list.

TOP TEN FOLK/TRADITIONAL RELEASES

As the blog is for (mostly) celtic punk so it is that we only review stuff that isn’t celtic punk if we really really (really!!) like it. All these rocked our boat and we loved each of them all to bits. If you like celtic-punk then you should not be afraid to give traditional folk a listen. Most of it is more punk than punk these days you know. It’s a direct link to the music that inspired celtic punk music and their are some amazing bands and performers out there. Hard to decide which order they should go in especially as O’Hanlons Horsebox could have just as easily won this years Best Celtic Punk Album as well! This is how the Top Ten ended up.

TOP CELTIC PUNK WEB-SITE

Again Waldo over at Celtic Folk Punk And More walks away with this award. There is simply no better site on the internet. Everything you would possibly need to know is here with a HUGE range of bands covered and there is no doubt in my mind that the site you are reading here now would not exist without the inspiration of Celtic Folk Punk And More. Sadly Waldo published a post on January 3rd titled ‘New Year, New Life’ (here) announcing the suspension of the site for a while. We wish Waldo well and look forward to his, and his fantastic web site’s, return.

* The lists were compiled from the scraps of crumpled paper, and one beermat, handed to me by the other three admins from the London Celtic Punks Facebook page and tallied up over several pints of beer in a seedy working man’s Irish boozer in north London.

Sláinte, The London Celtic Punks Crew- 2015

all the major players in celtic-punk do Best Of lists so click below to check out what they thought

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Sigelpa are truly one of the best and inventive celtic-punk bands in the scene right now!

Late last year Mrs London Celtic Punk decided it was time we go off on a proper holiday somewhere. Sick and tired of going to the seaside with me she said what about Barcelona? Now i don’t have travellers legs to be honest. I made it to London and that has been it really, but Barca… hmm “why not” I thought. So off she went to book the tickets and off I went to message Sigelpa that I would be coming to visit and would they be playing anywhere that week. I was heart broken to hear their reply that they were out on tour and my heart sank even further when The Drink Hunters said they were too! Still a lovely week was had wandering around that lovely city getting incredibly sun burnt thanks to my Celtic genes, plastering the place in London Celtic Punks stickers and getting plastered on Estrella!

The word on the street has it that Sigelpa will be releasing their follow up album to last years brilliant ‘TerraMorta!’ later in the year but in the meantime heres a wee five track EP of four originals and one cover to keep us going. That first album ranked very highly for us and it strolled in at 13 in our ‘Best Albums Of 2014’ list (read article here) so to say we are looking forward to the follow up is an understatement.

Sigelpa come from Terrassa in the Barcelona region of Catalonia and they mix up punk, hardcore and good old fashioned Irish folk music. Everything about the band is pretty amazing right down to their extremely clever name. Its a acronym of the initials of the seven deadly sins in Catalonian. Superbia/ Pride, Ira/ Wrath, Gula/ Gluttony, Enveja/ Envy, Luxuria/ Lust, Peresa/ Sloth and Avaricia/ Greed.

‘Ens Van Diagnosticar Un Transtorn’ means ‘We Got Diagnosed A Disorder’ in Catalan but theres certainly nothing wrong with this band! The EP’s five tracks sail past incredibly in just over ten minutes. The energy is boundless and will have you leaping around on first listen. The instrumental ‘3.0’ kicks the EP off with some great solo Irish fiddle until the guitar and drums kick in and accordion soon follows. A great tune of pure bred Irish folk-punk. ‘Necroguateke’ follows and sorry but I can’t tell you the story as its all in Catalan like the majority of their recordings. Dual male/ female vocals work extremely well, especially in a scene where there is a lack of female vocalists. Just when you start to think that Sigelpa have stood still and are happy to stay within the confines of celtic-punk ‘Sant Jordi’ follows and gruff vocals and fast loud guitar can’t hide the bluegrass roots of the superb tune and the bands progression. ‘Dacrifilia’ returns them to what they are best at. Again the dual vocals are there and again the accordion is to the fore with fast guitars before it all slows down for a nice bit of ska before building up again and letting go again. The mental Pogues classic ‘Bottle Of Smoke’ ends the EP and Sigelpa keep the pace and manicness of the original going. A great tale of one of lifes losers bet on the horses coming in accordion starts before Shane MacGowans words are spat out over fast Catalan celtic-punk. The man himself would be as proud as punch.

“The moon is clear
The sky is bright
I’m happy as the horses shite
Up came the Bottle of Smoke”

Sigelpa are a great band who put great thought into all they do. Their debut album was outstanding and ‘Ens Van Diagnosticar Un Transtorn’ is as well. The sound that has served them so well has been expanded on and developed and I can only see Sigelpa getting bettter and better. The band have generously made it available for free (or ‘name your price’) so its not even a gamble like the ‘Bottle Of Smoke’ get it downloaded now and sit back (or go mental!) to one of the best, and certainly one of the most inventive, celtic-punk bands in the scene right now.

(you can listen to the entire EP below by pressing play below. Its available to download on ‘Name Your Price’ so please be generous if you can but if you are short then download for free… guilt free!)

Last year our ‘Best Of’ list was completely dominated by bands from these shores but this time there’s a much more international flavour to 2014’s Best Album’s list. Again Irish influenced bands dominate but the absolute standout album for me was without a doubt Uncle Bard And The Dirty Bastards from Italy who nailed their fusion of punk rock and traditional music completely. With their own roots and influences included along with some amazing uilleann piping they are deserved winners of the Best Album spot. Kitchen Implosion join them in what has been a great year for Italian bands. Sure not all of these twenty bands are celtic-punk in the dictionary definition of the phrase but sod that anyway. These are what we liked and they all fit in in some way. Twenty bands from thirteen countries (Italy, England, Sweden, Brittany, Canada, Ireland, USA, Australia, Brazil, Catalonia, Germany, Switzerland and Belguim) which only goes to show the international appeal of the celtic-punk scene these days. A special mention for London Irish band Creeds Cross superb debut album. Only just caught them live and they were awesome so hoping to see much more of them around town in 2015.

As ever we have reviewed some, though not all of these albums, so click (here) after the title and you will be re-directed to our review.

We compiled the ‘Best Of’ lists together from the scraps of paper handed to me by the various admins from the London Celtic Punks facebook page.

a special special mention for three absolutely brilliant compilation albums too. Can’t really include them in the Best of charts so heres all three in no particular order at all as they are all 11 out of 10!

a class album with 4 songs per band and an absolutely beautifully put together record. THE PORTERS/ THE JUDAS BUNCH/ THE MAHONES/ MALASANERS 4-WAY SPLIT DOUBLE ALBUM- ‘Welcome To The Folk Punk Show’ (2014) here

a mostly Russian compilation paying tribute to all (lets just face it they are!) our favourite celtic-punk band- ‘Ex-USSR Tribute To The Dropkick Murphys’ (2014) here

this ought to be the number one album of the year to be honest. a fecking amazing compilation of Indonesian celtic-punk bands.the quality is amazing throughout.absolutely stunning. I cannot recommend enough!! ‘Wind From The Foreign Land- Indonesian Celtic-Punk Compilation’ (2014) here

TOP FIVE CELTIC PUNK EP’S OF 2015

No question which EP deserved this and Russia’s Middle Class Bastards just blasted us away with their follow up to their 2013 album. Superb use of bagpipes and brass instruments combined with fast but tuneful punk rock. A bit unfortunate for Black Water County who looked nailed on to win this for most of the year with their fantastic 2nd EP. The Breton band The Maggie Whackers released their EP back at the start of the year while The South Sea Ramblers from South Africa literally released theirs just a couple of weeks ago while LQR from Holland slipped theirs out in time for St Patricks Day… ooh err missus! So spread out across the year but these are the ones that left their mark. Looking forward to hearing more from them all and long players must be arriving soon I hope.

As the blog is for (mostly) celtic punk so it is that we only review stuff that isn’t celtic punk if we really really (really!!) like it. All these rocked our boat and we loved them all to bits. Hard to decide which order they should go in but this is how we ended up. Turned out to be an all Irish list with I DRAW SLOW from Dublin with beautiful alternative country sounds and both Cork’s THE BUACHAILLS and London’s THE CRAICHEADS going head to head with both bands playing similar styles of music while Irish-American supergroup THE ALT’s debut album was a worthy runner-up to fellow Irish-Americans RUNA’s brillliant fourth album.

keeping the whole wide world up to date with what’s going on and who is doing who within celtic punk (and more!) while also supplying us with regular free downloads and free compilations. Waldo you’re great. Keep it up mate!

BEST GIGS

Apart from the ones we put on which were all amazing and showcased some amazing performances from JAY WARS and THE DEAD MAGGIES from Aus, THE GREENLAND WHALEFISHERS from Norway, a couple of benefit gigs for Mad Dog out The Popes (hope youre back on your guitar highkicking soon pal!), BLACK WATER COUNTY played their London debut and went down a fecking storm, me O’s mates STEVE WHITE AND THE PROTEST FAMILY were as superb as ever and released a fantastic album. One of the major highlights was discovering the quintessential London Celtic Punk in ANTO MORRA and we look forward to working with him again in the future. We teamed up with fellow Londoners of Urbankelt and will be doing so again too.

I also saw DAVID ROVICS for the first time, THE MEN THEY COULDN’T HANG’s amazing 30th anniversary show was incredible, NECK and their sadly ended residency at TChances which had us all pissed on Polish lager on Sunday afternoons for the first 6 months of the year, FLOGGING MOLLY in Reading in June which showed they havent lost a thing and are as great as ever, THE POGUE TRADERS were the best Pogues tribute band I ever seen. Disappointing was missing so many gigs where I just didnt have the cash especially The Pogues various outings. THE STANFIELDS from Canada seemed like a decent bunch of lads but their London gig was a total rip-off. The pre-gig ticket price was £7-50 which more than doubled to £15 on the door on the night. Oi bands watch out for charlaten promoters won’t you? Rebellion music fest brings loads of decent bands over to play but that means that they all end up playing in the same week so I had to forgo THE GO-SET’s return to London. Missed out on THE WOLFE TONES London gigs too due to work. All three of them! THE LAGAN have been brilliant. Far far too many of their gigs to go into detail so we have choosen the whole of St Patricks Weekend as our Number One! With NECK playing three gigs over the weekend and both THE BIBLE CODE SUNDAYS and THE LAGAN playing on the same day as well it seen a clean sweep of all the London bands done. Afterwards sick days were phoned in, headache pills were taken and the best St Patricks in donkeys was had.

Now were just looking forward to catching THE DROPKICK MURPHYS ‘Celtic Invasion ‘ Tour in Dublin and London this year round St Patricks Day.

Sláinte, The London Celtic Punks Crew- 2015

Of course all these things are very subjective so don’t be dismayed if your album ain’t here. What appeals to one don’t neccessarily appeal to another. It would be impossible to keep up with the multitude of celtic-punk related releases so these are the best of of what we actually did get to hear. All the various sites in the celtic-punk family had different winners so to see what they thought check out the Best Of lists of the following sites…

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Sigelpa is a band from Terrassa in the Barcelona region of Catalonia that mixes up punk, hardcore and good old fashioned Irish folk music. Everything about the band is pretty amazing right down to their extremely clever name. Its a acronym of the initials of the seven deadly sins in Catalonian. Superbia/ Pride, Ira/ Wrath, Gula/ Gluttony, Enveja/ Envy, Luxuria/ Lust, Peresa/ Sloth and Avaricia/ Greed.

A follow up to their 2011 demo ‘L’atac Dels Ultrapirates Pecadors’, the self produced ‘TerraMorta’ is their debut album and as ambitious a project has never, to my knowledge anyway, been tried within celtic-punk before. ‘TerraMorta’ is a concept album which means that the songs are connected and tell a story from beginning to end. The album comes up just short of a hour with 14 tracks and is packed to the gills with references to celtic folklore.

Rather unfortunatly I cannot comment anymore on what the actual concept is about as the lyrics are in Catalonian and being a product of the english education system means i can only speak english so here’s what the band have to say themselves

“It tells the storyof acity called TerraMortawhere people aresubject to their god/rulerSaint Patrick.But7 strangers arrive and push citizensto rebelagainsthim.”

The excellent CelticFolkPunkAndMore blog published a much more detailed review than we ever could so head over there, here, and find out a bit more.

So as interesting a story ever told in celtic-punk and we can’t understand it… so our review has to concentrate more on the music and luckily for us the music doesn’t disappoint either! All your typical rock instruments are boosted by excellent fiddle and accordion playing and with male and female duo vocals that give Sigelpa a totally unique feel. There are so few female vocalists in the scene, except for Brutus Daughter and Irish Moutarde i cannot think of any, but it makes for a refreshing change and besides I’m a big fan of duo vocals. The music itself veers all over the genres but with celtic at the base and it always returns to a fast and furious reel. Taking in elements of ska, metal, punk all the songs bar one are their own compositions and hats off to the band for attempting something so risky for their debut album. I can heartily recommend ‘TerraMorte’ to any celtic punk fan as the musicianship is breathtaking and even though its annoying not to be able to pick up on the fantastic tale within it I am more than happy to hear a band singing in their native language especially one which has many parallels with the celtic languages but is surviving much better. There’s enough here to keep you all satisfied but if anyone wants to write a detailed review of the actual story of ‘TerraMorte’ please do and send it to us. You can get the album, and previous Demo, for free or donation from Bandcamp below as a ‘name your own price’ download so take a risk an give it a chance.

Some of the tracks are quite lengthy, as is the way with concept albums, but nothing drags and in fact their longest song ‘La Passio Del Trist’, coming in at just under nine minutes, is the albums standout track for me and demonstrates Sigelpa’s genre stretching perfectly. Starting
off with a metal flavour it soon bounces into punk before the celtic kicks in. The vocals are perfect and the whole production is immaculate with all the musicians combining together seamlessly. Take a chance on Sigelpa you’ll not be found wanting at all!

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